Tardy Jackson nearly locked up

Late to molestation trial

Posted: Friday, March 11, 2005

By Linda DeutschAssociated Press

SANTA MARIA, Calif. - Michael Jackson went AWOL from his trial Thursday and was nearly jailed before he finally showed up more than an hour late, in his pajama bottoms and slippers, to listen as his accuser described his alleged molestation in graphic detail.

The pop star, wearing a coat over a T-shirt, walked gingerly into court after being treated at a hospital for what was described as a serious back problem. Jackson arrived after Judge Rodney S. Melville threatened to arrest him and revoke his $3 million bail; the judge later vacated the warrant.

Jurors got only a hint of the strange courtroom drama.

"Mr. Jackson had a medical problem and it was necessary for me to order his appearance," Melville told jurors, adding that he didn't want the panel to draw any negative inferences from the developments.

Jackson, 46, watched as his accuser described extensive liquor-laced visits with Jackson at Neverland, and of looking at sex magazines with the pop star and of being molested as he lay in Jackson's bed.

Under questioning by District Attorney Tom Sneddon, the boy said he remembered two sexual encounters.

In testimony that was hushed and sometimes mumbled, the young cancer survivor said Jackson molested him the first time in his bedroom under the covers after they returned from drinking in Neverland's arcade. It began with talk about masturbation, he claimed.

"He said if men don't masturbate they can get to a level where they might rape a girl or they can be kind of unstable," the boy said of Jackson.

The witness said he told Jackson he did not masturbate and Jackson said that if he didn't know how "he would do it for me."

He said Jackson masturbated him while they were under the bedcovers and he was wearing Jackson's pajamas.

The boy said the second molestation occurred "about a day after" and in that instance he resisted an attempt by Jackson to place the boy's hand on Jackson's genitals.